


pick it up (pick it all up)

by billboard_dinosaur



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, Amnesia, M/M, Memory Loss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2020-10-26
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:05:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27200137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/billboard_dinosaur/pseuds/billboard_dinosaur
Summary: Harry Potter has permanently lost all of his memories, and he can't reconcile the person he was before with the person he is now.Featuring an abundance of forest fire metaphors."It only takes a single spark to light a fire. Sometimes the source of that spark is never found."
Relationships: Harry Potter/Original Character(s)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 15





	pick it up (pick it all up)

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by a prompt from the r/HPfanfiction subreddit by u/Termsndconditions. I really enjoyed playing with this concept, and I hoped that I did it justice.
> 
> The title is taken from the first line of Medicine by Daughter. This beautiful song served as great mood music as I was writing this.

It only takes a single spark to light a fire. Sometimes the source of that spark is never found.

When a fire burns, it can leave nothing but charred ash in its wake. Black and gray soot covers the ground. Darkened monoliths stand in twisted shapes, husks of life, like a discarded shed skin. The sound after a fire is alien: leaves do not rustle, grasses do not bend, branches do not creak; birds do not sing, squirrels do not chatter, and cicadas do not click. It is quiet, it is bleak, it is different.

The overall landscape is the same. The hills remain hills, the streams remain streams, the boulders remain boulders, but the _life_ within those hills and streams and boulders is forever changed.

The ground is barren, the earth is void: emptiness, waiting to be filled.

When the snow falls, it covers everything in a uniform of white. The imperfections and darkness of the burned earth is hidden beneath the frozen water and the blankness is a promise that anything may come and fill this canvas. There may not be life beneath the white expanse, but there will be when the snow melts and spring comes.

The overall landscape is the same, but it is changed. The hills are there, but depending on the depth of the snow and the depth of the cold, the boulders appear like blemishes on smooth ground and the streams disguised as innocent soil. There is danger in walking through the snow, but there is that same danger in living, that same danger in life.

When the snow melts, he wakes, and the ground is fertile, the streams are beginning to thaw, and life begins to creep back to the land where it had once been destroyed. He wakes, and he is new.

He opens his eyes to find himself in what looks like a hospital. “Hello?”

A voice from the corner of the room. “You’re awake!”

“Hello?” he repeats and then tries to sit up. He blinks a few times and sees a woman with spectacularly bushy hair. He frowns. “Who are you?”

“Pardon?” she asks. “You know who I am.”

He shakes his head. “Actually, I don’t,” he confesses.

She freezes. “Are you being serious?”

He nods.

She says, “We need to get the Healer,” then walks out the door into the hallway beyond where it swings shut behind her. He can faintly hear her shout: _Healer! Please, this is urgent!_

He’s not sure why this would be such an urgent issue. What’s mainly concerning him is why a stranger was in _his_ hospital room. She obviously wasn’t a nurse—she was in plainclothes and was reading a book—she left it behind on her chair. And why was she calling the doctor a _healer_?

He casts his eyes about the room for any information cards; maybe a telephone so he can call—

So he can call—

Who would he call? He doesn’t remember—and then it hits him like a cartoon anvil crushes a character— _this_ is why he needs the doctor. He can’t remember _anything_. But why does he still know words? Why does he remember that cartoon characters sometimes get crushed by anvils and why does he remember telephones and hospitals and doctors and nurses and—

He’s about to panic when the doctor enters. The doctor is wearing the strangest outfit he thinks he’s ever seen—but since he can’t remember seeing _any_ outfit before, he knows it _is_ the strangest outfit he’s ever seen—and he can’t help but blurt, “I can’t remember anything!”

“Can you start by telling me your name?” the doctor asks, waving a surprisingly straight stick around.

“I’m—” and he realizes he doesn’t even remember his own _name_ , “I can’t remember. I don’t even know who I am, oh my _god_ , what’s happening to me?”

“Please, remain calm,” the doctor implores, still waving the stick around. The stick is producing strange lights and he begins to think he’s hallucinating as well.

“I think I’m hallucinating,” he says to the doctor.

“What do you mean?” the doctor asks, turning to meet his eyes. “What do you see?”

“Your stick—it’s making all sorts of lights and it’s just a _stick_ , I mean—why would it do that?”

This makes the girl gasp and cover her mouth, the doctor purse his lips. They’re quiet for a few seconds until he has to say _something_ to fill this silence. “Well? Am I going crazy? I mean, clearly I am because I’ve forgotten everything but I’m seeing things too, this is bad, right?”

“You have forgotten things, but you’re not seeing things,” the doctor says. He turns to the girl and says, “Do you want—I mean—I’ve—” He takes a deep breath before continuing, “I need to get some others in here to get their opinions before I make any diagnosis. Please, just make sure he doesn’t leave, okay?”

She nods. “I’ll do my best,” she says.

“What’s going on?” he asks her. “Who are you? What’s my name? What’s happening to me? Do I know you?”

She takes a fortifying breath.“I think you have amnesia.”

He nods. He’s come to this conclusion on his own.

“I’m Hermione Granger, and we’re friends—best friends,” she continues. “And your name is Harry Potter.”

He mouths the words _Harry Potter_. He doesn’t recognize it. It’s not familiar. He shakes his head. “It feels foreign.”

“Not even a little?”

“No,” he says. “They’re just words.”

The girl—Hermione—begins to cry. “Oh, _Harry_ ,” she says through her tears.

He leans back, and he closes his eyes against the bright light that doesn’t have a source. He squeezes his eyes tightly, tears seeping out through the corners from the pressure. He throws his mind into the past but nothing rises to answer his call; nothing but a vast emptiness, a void so encompassing and final, a space so endless and infinite, a desolation of time and being.

He presses the base of his palms into his eyes while shaking his head, unable to come to terms with his fate.

Retrograde amnesia. A distant term for a ever-present condition. In which one loses the memory of all events prior to a certain point in time. The doctors, or healers, as they are called in this hospital, say that most if not all autobiographical, declarative, and episodic memory was lost. Procedural memory was still intact, which was why he remembered speech, movement, vocabulary. But his experiences? His childhood? Gone, as if they never existed in the first place.

“Is there anyway to recover his memories?” Hermione asks.

No way exists. They have been erased. Destroyed. They are not hidden, they are not repressed—they are gone. Entirely, completely, absolutely.

A steady river of visitors come to see him in the hospital. His days are filled with apologies.

“I’m sorry, but could you tell me your name and how we know each other?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t remember.”

“I’m sorry, who are you talking about?”

“I’m sorry, but I’ve forgotten everything.”

“Yes, _everything_.”

He hears anecdotes about a stranger that was a hero. He reads about a stranger who did marvelous things. He listens as people tell him about a stranger that was kind, brave, good.

That stranger was him, but he is not that stranger.

People do not seem to understand this distinction. People look at him and expect to see this stranger, and he does not measure up. He cannot meet their expectations because he is not who they think he is.

Their disappointment is visible and tangible and it pains him and it _angers_ him.

He has changed, and so they must adapt. They cannot continue to expect these things from him; they cannot continue to to act as if things are as they once were. He can’t _fix_ it—these stories they tell him are about a stranger who was too selfless for his own good, too sacrificial, too magnanimous. He’s not so sure if he can fill those shoes. He’s not sure he wants to.

They tell him magic is real, that he killed an evil wizard, that he saved the world. But they don’t seem to understand that _he_ did none of these things; those actions belong to someone else, not him. They don’t belong to him.

Hermione visits with a man whose hand she holds and introduces him as Ronald ( _call me Ron_ ) Weasley. She tells him about how they were all best friends, how they knew each other since they were eleven. He asks them how old he is. _Seventeen. You’ll be eighteen July 31._ With every word that reveals the depth of his amnesia, they become despondent--something they try to hide, but he can’t help but notice. Ron says that they saved Hermione from a troll. Ron seems prepared to continue on a moment-by-moment explanation of their shared lives together.

He raises his hand to stop him. “Please,” he says. “Don’t.”

Ron jerks backwards in surprise, taken aback. “What do you mean, don’t?”

Frowning, he explains, “You’re trying to make me into him. But I’m _not_ him. And I’m sorry, but I’ll never _be_ him.”

“But you _are_ him!” Hermione interrupts. “You’ve just forgotten—and if we give you _our_ memories, then it’ll be like nothing ever happened!”

He shakes his head with a sorrowful smile. “That’s not how it works,” he says. “Nothing about what I felt, what I thought and learned and grew into would come from that. I would just be learning history.”

“But it’s _our_ history,” she insists, “and you deserve to know it.”

“It’s not about deserving. It’s about who _I_ am, what _I_ want, what _I_ will become, not what you want me to be.”

“But you’re still the same Harry we love. Why are you pushing us away?” she pleads.

“Because you’re trying to make me into someone I can never be!” he shouts. “Because I’m never going to be him! You’re trying to regain your friend but he’s _gone_. I’m what’s left. I’ve accepted this, and it’s time you do too. Your friend is gone. Maybe we can become friends—but it needs to be on new terms, with new foundations. I’m not him. I’m _me_.”

She puts her hand on his knee. “Harry, you’re just saying this because you’re scared—“

“I’m not scared! I’m being realistic!”

“I think he’s right, Hermione,” Ron says. Hermione turns to look at him in betrayal.

“Why would you say that?” she asks.

“We have to trust him,” Ron says. “And—and he’s not the same Harry we even met when we were eleven. I mean—he didn’t even flinch when you touched him.”

Hermione’s eyes widen. She looks at where her hand still rests on Harry’s leg and she retracts it as if it were on fire. “Oh,” she says.

“I don’t understand,” he says, a common refrain. “Why would I flinch when you touched me?”

Hermione and Ron exchange a glance. “It doesn’t matter anymore, but you weren’t treated well as a child,” Ron says before Hermione can speak.

“I’ll be honest with you,” he says after the silence extends until it becomes uncomfortable. “I’m grateful for the amnesia. How many people get to have a second chance? How many people get to start over? From everything I’ve heard, his life was shitty.”

“I don’t think it’s healthy for you to dissociate like that,” Hermione says under her breath.

Rage floods him. “I don’t think you’re in the position to tell me anything of the sort,” he snaps. “You’re not the one whose forgotten their entire past. I’m coping the way I know how.”

She looks immediately apologetic, and he almost feels bad. “I’m just trying to help,” she says.

“I know,” he says gently, “and I’m grateful for everything you’ve done—for the time you’ve spent with me, for the help you’ve given me in adjusting to this world. I’m sorry I can’t be who you want me to be.”

Ron takes Hermione’s hand. “We want you to be who _you_ want to be. We thought that was who you once were,” he says. “And we’re sorry for trying to push you in that direction. It’s just—hard.”

“It’s like we’ve lost another person to the war,” Hermione says through tears, glancing at Ron. “And it’s you, and you’re right here, _alive_ , and we love you so much and it breaks my heart to see you cope in a way that I don’t want you to, but Ron’s right—I have no right to determine the best way for you to do so.”

“Thank you,” he says. “I know this is harder for you than it is for me.”

Hermione manages to smile as she wipes her eyes. “Can we help you, in any way?”

“We’ll do anything for you,” Ron agrees, squeezing Hermione’s hand tighter. “We’re here for you.”

After being discharged from the hospital, he tries to live in Britain, he really does. But after only two weeks of being mobbed for being a hero he never was, he decides his only solution is to leave.

Ron and Hermione help him move to New Zealand. He hugs them good-bye, and promises to write. He thinks that they must have really loved _him_ to care for him this much. He’s not deserving of such love, but he can be grateful for it regardless.

He moves into a small ground floor flat. The neighbors above him are noisy, walking loudly, talking loudly, living loudly. He introduces himself to them a few days after moving in.

They begin their friendship with an apology. “We’re sorry if we’re too loud! Just bang on the ceiling if we are—the walls are so thin!”

And he smiles because this lack of recognition, this _mutual_ introduction is what he has been _craving_. The equality of anonymity.

“I’ll be sure to use my broom,” he says, and he means it in a completely _non-magical_ way. He has no desire to learn magic, not after hearing what it did to who he was _before_.

They smile at him, and he learns their names are Paul and Wilhelmina ( _Mina, please_ ). They’re siblings, they’re nice, and they soon become friends.

Spring bursts throughout the land and life firmly takes root. Green covers the ground. In a few years, it will be as if fire never touched this earth. The wound will heal, the scar will fade. Life goes on.

The seasons are backwards, here. Wintertime is summer, summertime is winter. The juxtaposition of the southern hemisphere’s seasons and his own mental state provides him no small amount of material to ponder. It is October: springtime. Britain was deep in the throes of autumn—the depths of decay, destruction, death. He can’t help but find comfort in the symbolism that he has come to a place during the time of greatest growth.

Mina and Paul are regular visitors in his apartment. They’re curious: excited to have someone near their age living in the same area. They’re amusing: often so nonchalant about their tasks they avoid going up the stairs to their own flat and instead drop in on his space.

He doesn’t mind. They’re kind: Mina randomly baked him a cake for Labour Day; Paul helped him install a bookshelf in his flat. He welcomes their presence and they take him in like another member of the family.

When asked about his past, they easily accept his explanation that he has amnesia and wanted to start over. They are mindful of his past. Sometimes they make mistakes, but he forgives them easily as well.

Time passes. Mina applies, is accepted, and leaves for university. Paul remains behind.

He thinks everything will change, that Paul will never visit him again, that his friendships will fall apart—but things don’t.In fact, Paul spends even more time with him now. They spends long hours together in his flat, talking about nothing, about dreams, hopes, fears. They visit the city, enjoy the nightlife. They go to the parks, hike the trails. He meets Paul’s friends and they become his own. And—

And he thinks he just might be happy here.

Mina calls them weekly, and they answer her calls together. One evening, Mina asks to speak to him alone. Paul leaves.

“Is he gone?” Mina asks.

Harry responds in the affirmative.

“You better not break his heart,” she says. “I’m not there to threaten you in person, but consider this my familial duty completed. Take care of him. I’m glad you’re so happy together.”

“What are you talking about?” he asks.

“You’re dating him, right?”

He hesitates as the moths in his stomach spring towards his throat like his mouth is the sun. “Well, no? I don’t think so.”

Mina swears. “Are you serious? What do you think you’ve been doing, then?”

“We’re friends, is all,” he mutters as the flurry of emotions— _pleasure_ , _fear_ , _elation_ , _terror_ —swells within his soul.

“You’re not acting like friends,” Mina says. “You’re acting like you’re dating, and I know you, and I know you’re basically in love with my brother, Harry. Make it official, _please_.”

He makes a croaking sound as he searches for words.

Mina steamrolls over him. “For God’s sake, my brother deserves to officially call you his boyfriend.”

He continues to struggle. “That sounds so silly,” is what he manages to blurt.

“Then call him your partner! It doesn’t matter! Just—just tell him you like him and that you’re dating now, so that I can pretend this conversation never happened.”

He croaks again.

“Well, glad that’s settled then. Bye, talk to you next week!” Mina hangs up the phone.

Paul comes back into the room when he hears the phone being put back into its cradle.

“What’d she have to say?” Paul asks.

“She threatened me to not hurt you in our relationship,” he says, turning to look into Paul’s eyes. He’s not as oblivious as Mina thinks. He knows he’s attracted to Paul, that they’ve been steadily heading in this direction since Mina left for uni. He just never wanted to risk the possibility that he might be wrong—that his sense there was mutual attraction was just a misread signal—that if he took a chance, his friendship would shatter. His fear was greater than any possible gain. But Mina’s behavior gave him hope, and a good way to test the waters.

Paul blinks, blank-faced. “Did she?”

He nods.

Paul sits closely to him. Their legs brush. “She didn’t threaten to pull out the knife, did she? She has a fascination with this one knife our uncle has; it has a mammoth handle,” Paul says.

“She didn’t,” he says.

“Wow,” Paul smiles. “She must like you.”

He takes a fortifying breath. “ _I_ like you,” he says.

If Paul was smiling before, it cannot compare on any level to the smile that now appears on Paul’s face. He’s beaming; his face is bright with a sunlit soul.

“Good,” he says. “I like you too.”

Some ecosystems depend on fire for their health. Wildfires are the only way to ensure the wellbeing of the forest. The pinecones conceal seeds deep within their shells that cannot grow in a dense forest; but for any matter, these seeds cannot escape on their own. The pinecones need the intense heat of the raging, burning fire in order to release the seeds hidden within. The seeds sprout, and they can grow. For some trees, the death of the parent enables the birth of the child. Perhaps it is a brutal system, perhaps it is a cruel system. But perhaps it is a beautiful system.

But some parent trees may survive—their bark is resistant to the flames, but the undergrowth is susceptible to that equalizing fire. With the undergrowth cleared, the pine tree seeds have access to the sky, have access to water, have access to the soil. They can grow: they _do_ grow. A second generation of pine trees is born. Each subsequent cycle will generate trees that are more adapted, more perfect for their environment. Perhaps an unforgiving system; perhaps a balancing system; perhaps a perfecting system. Fire is not always devastating: it can be necessary and well.

The seasons will continue in their regular pattern, summer-autumn-winter-spring, and life will persist. No matter the cost, no matter the price: life finds a way. Do better ways exist? Maybe. But _this_ way exists, and _this_ is the way that was chosen.


End file.
